Dishwashers, and in particular dishwashers designed for domestic use, are often provided with a cutlery basket or a cutlery tray for stacking cutlery pieces. Most commonly, cutlery baskets are detachably arranged within the lower rack of the dishwasher, and arranged for essentially vertical reception of cutlery. Cutlery trays are arranged for substantially horizontal reception of cutlery, and are adapted to be extractably arranged in the dishwasher, e.g. in the upper part of the dishwasher, above the upper rack.
An example of a cutlery tray is disclosed in US 2010155280 A which shows a cutlery tray for a dishwasher including a frame extendably disposed in a washing tub, and a plurality of inserts movably disposed on the frame and adapted to hold dishware. The plurality of inserts includes a first horizontally displaceable insert and at least one vertically displaceable insert. A central insert is mounted between the two lateral inserts. The central insert, just as the lateral inserts, is designed as a plastic mesh insert having wires embedded therein by injection molding, and has a trapezoidal indentation allowing larger cutlery items (serving ladles, etc.) to be received therein.
In US 2010117498 A a cutlery drawer for dishwashers comprising a base section and a holding device for holding a cutlery items, is disclosed. The holding device includes two fastening sections that fastens the holding device to the base section and a center section that connects the two fastening sections to each other. The two fastening sections are configured to hold an item of cutlery on both sides of the item.
EP 0186157 A discloses a domestic dishwasher with a removable crockery basket and a separate cutlery basket in which items of cutlery can be placed for the purpose of washing. The cutlery basket provides cutlery slots in the form of cutlery holders and cutlery rests for individual items or cutlery placed separately and lengthwise alongside one another in the slots.
Thus, a variety of cutlery trays for stacking cutlery pieces have been suggested. However, the inventors of the present invention have identified a need for a cutlery tray, which provides quick and easy unloading of the cutlery items, and which provides improved cleaning of the cutlery items.
An object of the present invention is to provide a cutlery tray which facilitates unloading, of the cutlery items from the cutlery tray.
A further object of the present invention is to provide a cutlery tray with a user friendly surface.
Another object of the present invention is to provide a cutlery tray which provides thoroughly cleaning of the cutlery items in the dishwasher.